A blog about individual and community development using new information and communication technologies, especially e-learning, open educational resources, open source, Web 2.0, blogs, wikis, social networking, social bookmarking, semantic web and other social software.

2013-04-29

Non-profit Worldreader has brought more than half a million e-books to children in Africa via the 10,000 Kindles it's distributed. After a one-year pilot program, the organization has launched Worldreader Mobile, a way for any feature phone user with a 2G connection to read more than 1,400 books for free.
"Feature phones are omnipresent in the developing world. They're people's lifelines; they're where they get their access to payments and the Internet," Susan Moody, Worldreader's director of marketing and communications, tells Mashable. IPhones and similar smartphones may be buzzworthy, she says, but they apply to a proportionally small number of people. Five billion people are using feature phones that run on 2G networks.

The aim of this research was studying the effect of integrating problem-based learning with Information and Communications Technology (ICT) on developing content knowledge and teaching skill of trainee teachers. The research design was a quasi-experimental one, and the participants were elementary education trainee teachers of Shahid Bahonar teacher training center of Hamadan, Iran. Two groups were given tests of theory and practice on teaching mathematical concepts at elementary school, and then a multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted to compare the pretest-posttest scores. There was a significant difference, in both multivariate and univariate analyses, in scores. The findings suggest that trainee teachers who integrate problem-based learning with ICT in solving a problem may develop more professional content knowledge and teaching skill than those who merely employ ICT.

Studies out of Ethiopia, India, Kenya and Niger show that children born during natural hazards, like droughts or floods, are more likely to be malnourished. Yet as the climate changes, it is poor countries - already struggling with hunger and food insecurity - that are increasingly likely to face these natural hazards.
A recent conference considered this issue from the perspective of “climate justice” - an approach to climate change focusing on the rights of vulnerable people who are the least responsible for causing climate change but among the most affected.

Mauritius is among the few African countries where the interactive whiteboard has been implemented in all primary schools. This has been possible thanks to the Sankoré project, an initiative of Franco-British Summit and the Government of Mauritius.
The interactive whiteboard is an important tool in the classroom as it changes the mode of instruction. In this research project, an educational learning tool was designed and mounted using XERTE which is an Open Source Authoring tool, to test whether interactive whiteboard can improve learning in schools.

Stewart-Marshall's insight:
Agriculture Nepal is a social network platform to gather all the Nepalese agriculturist on the single place. Our ultimate goal is to build communications, share information, create opportunities, and develop a nationwide agriculture data bank.

Online IT programs and courses help in providing the knowledge and skills required for jobs in this challenging field of IT and computer engineering. This page provides more details of the programs available, the schools where they can be taken, the career prospects, and more ...read more

2013-04-23

Supply chain management degree programs are ideal for people interested in obtaining supply chain management certification for enhancing their careers in business, government, nonprofit, or military settings.read more

We all knew it. We saw this coming in Haiti and talked about it in Egypt, when 5 Ushahidi maps popped out the day before the elections. But the Kenyan elections are somehow different, and the reason why they are, is that the possible outcome is indeed a civil unrest that could bring the country years back to 2007.
It was recently election day in Kenya, and a lot of organizations prepared for that day by setting up their own branded, advertised, funded and public electoral monitoring system.

War, natural disaster and the ravages of time threaten the very existence of this literature. In Mali, though the manuscripts may have been saved by a hair’s breadth from instant destruction, they are still at risk from neglect, deterioration, and the encroachment of the desert sands. The Ethiopian manuscripts face similar dangers: a 2011 British Library report on the monastic collection at East Gojjam found that the manuscripts were “in danger of being eaten by rats or insects… exposed to damage from rainwater… [stored] unlocked, or locked only with cheap locks, which can easily be broken or forced open.” For centuries, the seclusion of monastery libraries and the isolation of Timbuktu have helped to preserve intact collections that could otherwise have been scattered and lost. However, strategies must now be developed both to preserve them for posterity and to improve access to one of Africa’s precious resources.

2013-04-22

This book integrates research, action research, best practice and case studies detailing how some educators have embraced the opportunities afforded by mobile learning. In particular, it brings together a range of scenarios, solutions and discussions relating to mobile learning in development and other resource challenged contexts.

The Canadian government is changing how we think of traditional Web management. They built a platform of standards-compliant (HTML5, WCAG and WAI-ARIA), accessible and secure components that its agencies (and even provincial and municipalities) can use to build and maintain their sites. They are also focused on optimizing for mobile devices and improving usability and interoperability through their platform. Paul Jackson, project lead and one of the lead developers for Canada’s Web Experience Toolkit, or WET, shared details about the toolkit and how anyone can get involved, during a DigitalGov University webinar, April 17.

The results from the 2013 Future of Open Source Survey are in — thanks to everyone who contributed by completing the survey. You can read an overview of the results here, or see the detailed breakdowns in the slides at the end of this post.

2013-04-19

The role of a special education teacher is to create a learning environment to meet the unique needs of students who are learning disabled, developmentally challenged or gifted and talented.
Find out about special education masters online programs, where you can take them, what the prospects and salary are, and more ....

This article details the spread and scope of large-scale 1:1 computing initiatives around the world. What follows is a review of the existing literature around 1:1 programs followed by a description of the large-scale 1:1 database. Main findings include: 1) the XO and the Classmate PC dominate large-scale 1:1 initiatives; 2) if professional development was conducted within a 1:1 initiatives, it was done at the onset of the project by venders of the hardware; 3) funding for 1:1 initiatives appears to be provided initially but not as a reoccurring expense.

Venue: KINU Co-Creation and Innovation Space, 1st Floor Conservation House Plot No.245, A. H. Mwinyi Road, Dar es Salaam
Date and time: 24- 28 June, 2013 (9:00 - 17:00)
Technological innovation is taking place at a breath-taking pace. Simple, open source internet-based applications and services designed to enhance on-line collaboration are now available to the wider public at little or no cost at all. These new online technologies known as Web 2.0 and ‘social media’ enable people to collaborate to create, share and publish information.

2013-04-18

Mr Paarock Vanpercy, Director General of the National Communications Authority, says the promotion of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) as a tool for development, must embrace all genders.
He said even though ICT has become a lucrative sector in terms of job creation, business growth and rewards, career in ICT had somehow become mainly dominated by males.
Mr Vanpercy made the remarks in a speech read on his behalf by Mrs Florence Martey, NCA Deputy Engineer, at a “Girls in ICT” Marathon training programme on Wednesday in Accra.

Africa’s leading forum for the technology-assisted learning industry, eLearning Africa, will on May 29th-31st be celebrating the rise of ‘Made in Africa’ tech solutions in Windhoek, Namibia, at the 2013 edition of its annual conference.
Now in its eighth year, eLearning Africa will be bringing together a wide range of perspectives on ICT for development, education and training. The conference will also be preceded by the annual eLearning Africa round table meeting of education and ICT ministers from across Africa.
“This year our focus will be on innovation and we are all really proud that some of the most exciting and innovative new solutions in education have been pioneered and developed in Africa”, says Rebecca Stromeyer, founder of eLearning Africa and Executive Director of ICWE.

This United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) distance post-literacy project in Pakistan is based on mobile technology. Women are able to reinforce their newly gained literacy by accessing and sending mobile phone text messages. UNESCO implemented the "Mobile Based Post Literacy Pilot Project" in its initial phase in 2009 in partnership with Mobilink Pakistan and BUNYAD Foundation and, with additional partners, initiated a third phase in March 2012 using other information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the classrooms during the teaching cycle, including DVDs.

Information is power. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have had a dramatic impact on the services (access to healthcare, education and clean water) that the poorest people receive - but have failed to shift power to ordinary people in the fight to end poverty.

Please share this film using #post2015 so that we can make sure that the post-2015 framework makes a real difference to the fight against absolute poverty.

2013-04-17

A recent BBC article highlighted three of the tech-heavy startups trying to change the game in Africa's agriculture sector, including a franchise that gives farmers access to higher quality products, a crop insurance scheme that makes it easier for farmers to get credit, and an SMS service through which farmers can check market prices and coordinate with other farmers to buy supplies in bulk. As observed in the article, these tech solutions try to leapfrog over basic infrastructure problems – like bad roads and inefficient communications. Considering the fact that 80 percent of the arable land in Africa is not being used, tech has an awful lot to make up for.

2013-04-16

Elementary education degrees prepare you for jobs in education and administration in elementary or primary education, which usually incorporates at least the first five grades of compulsory education in the US.
This page provides information on these degrees, what is studied in them, where you can study them, the prospects, and more ...